4 ms·

Can I run my own node? If not, then I don't care (although a forum interface would I think be vastly superior to the usual news feed interface). Edit: this is

Can I run my own node? If not, then I don't care (although a forum interface would I think be vastly superior to the usual news feed interface). Edit: this is not meant to be dismissive, it's just that the main problem with social media right now is centralization. I'm simply not interested in jumping from one centralized option to another.

sergiomattei 5y ago
- Ourgon 5y ago
  It may have been somewhat curt but the essence stands: if "social" networking is to have a future the controls should be in the hands of the individual contributors, not in those of a few site owners. Even if your ideas align with current site owners this may change in the future, either because of an ownership change or because you change your mind. Even if you disagree with the people currently being censored and "de-platformed" you should realise that the same fate will await those who you agree with when the zeitgeist changes - as it has been doing forever and will keep on doing whether you like it or not. So, to the author a repeated question: will it be possible to self-host this system? Does it support federation or are there plans to do so in the near future? The time is ripe for a robust distributed discussion platform to compete with the onslaught of "alternative" centralised social networking services which each seem to have their few minutes of (in)fame but mostly end up in the same situation as the entrenched actors they were meant to replace.
- Chris2048 5y ago
marginalia_nu 5y ago
Is centralization really the problem, though? I feel like in a lot of ways, something like Mastodon isn't much better than Twitter, should it somehow take over. Sure you have a lot of servers, but they all run the same software and approach the problem in the same way. It's a decentralized monoculture replacing a centralized one. How many servers they are run on really doesn't matter. What we need is multiple different paradigms. This, even if it's just one guy running one server, is a step in the right direction. What I'd most of all like is something that lets the visitors own their own posts while still allowing some form of communication. Dunno, like something combining RSS and a forum.
- anr13 5y ago
  I plan on making things extremely open like the API with no limits at all. The front end is just one JS block of code so really easy to modify and make a custom version. I like the idea of running your own instances but I find that never works well on the user side for consistency, but offering an open API for anyone to make a client they like is where I want to see it go.
- zozbot234 5y ago
  > Sure you have a lot of servers, but they all run the same software and approach the problem in the same way. The 'servers' are simply endpoints within a federated network. You can have a frontend "app" interoperate with those endpoints while exposing a different UX, perhaps one that's more old-school BBS- or forum-like. Or you can have endpoints that expose a slightly diverging logic, perhaps building on other web standards (such as WebMention) for their analogs of the BBS-like "reply", "topic", "thread" etc. But since these are all part of one Fediverse, interoperability across endpoints will be preserved. > What I'd most of all like is something that lets the visitors own their own posts while still allowing some form of communication. This can happen if the visitor owns a server and makes their posts available from there via Fediverse standards. The posts can then either be federated directly (if allowed), or "mentioned" (like a trackback) on other servers. ActivityStreams is the "RSS" like standard in the Fediverse, which can be implemented entirely statically, with no "active" server-side logic whatsoever. ActivityPub is the active "push" part of the standard, which enables "post" workflows from users; the server itself can also use ActivityPub to "push" its content to a federated endpoint in the network, which removes any propagation delays introduced by polling.
  - marginalia_nu 5y ago
    I guess I don't really see the point of the Fediverse. Like wouldn't it be a lot easier if you could just host your stuff on your server? It just seems so convoluted, and right now the only on-ramps are incredibly bloated.
    - zozbot234 5y ago

sergiomattei 5y ago

Ourgon 5y ago
It may have been somewhat curt but the essence stands: if "social" networking is to have a future the controls should be in the hands of the individual contributors, not in those of a few site owners. Even if your ideas align with current site owners this may change in the future, either because of an ownership change or because you change your mind. Even if you disagree with the people currently being censored and "de-platformed" you should realise that the same fate will await those who you agree with when the zeitgeist changes - as it has been doing forever and will keep on doing whether you like it or not. So, to the author a repeated question: will it be possible to self-host this system? Does it support federation or are there plans to do so in the near future? The time is ripe for a robust distributed discussion platform to compete with the onslaught of "alternative" centralised social networking services which each seem to have their few minutes of (in)fame but mostly end up in the same situation as the entrenched actors they were meant to replace.
Chris2048 5y ago

marginalia_nu 5y ago

Is centralization really the problem, though? I feel like in a lot of ways, something like Mastodon isn't much better than Twitter, should it somehow take over. Sure you have a lot of servers, but they all run the same software and approach the problem in the same way. It's a decentralized monoculture replacing a centralized one. How many servers they are run on really doesn't matter. What we need is multiple different paradigms. This, even if it's just one guy running one server, is a step in the right direction. What I'd most of all like is something that lets the visitors own their own posts while still allowing some form of communication. Dunno, like something combining RSS and a forum.

anr13 5y ago
I plan on making things extremely open like the API with no limits at all. The front end is just one JS block of code so really easy to modify and make a custom version. I like the idea of running your own instances but I find that never works well on the user side for consistency, but offering an open API for anyone to make a client they like is where I want to see it go.
zozbot234 5y ago
> Sure you have a lot of servers, but they all run the same software and approach the problem in the same way. The 'servers' are simply endpoints within a federated network. You can have a frontend "app" interoperate with those endpoints while exposing a different UX, perhaps one that's more old-school BBS- or forum-like. Or you can have endpoints that expose a slightly diverging logic, perhaps building on other web standards (such as WebMention) for their analogs of the BBS-like "reply", "topic", "thread" etc. But since these are all part of one Fediverse, interoperability across endpoints will be preserved. > What I'd most of all like is something that lets the visitors own their own posts while still allowing some form of communication. This can happen if the visitor owns a server and makes their posts available from there via Fediverse standards. The posts can then either be federated directly (if allowed), or "mentioned" (like a trackback) on other servers. ActivityStreams is the "RSS" like standard in the Fediverse, which can be implemented entirely statically, with no "active" server-side logic whatsoever. ActivityPub is the active "push" part of the standard, which enables "post" workflows from users; the server itself can also use ActivityPub to "push" its content to a federated endpoint in the network, which removes any propagation delays introduced by polling.
- marginalia_nu 5y ago
  I guess I don't really see the point of the Fediverse. Like wouldn't it be a lot easier if you could just host your stuff on your server? It just seems so convoluted, and right now the only on-ramps are incredibly bloated.
  - zozbot234 5y ago